For so long, I mean, it’s kind of disgusting… the smut that you write.” Barks the stout middle aged man whilst walking around in the garden of the slovenly seated man. He is sat slumped in a deck chair, bent low over his dirty keyboard, the man looks up from his cracked screen and blinks rapidly in the glare of the hot overhead sun. Both to moisten his eyes after staring for a long period of time, and to give himself an excuse to cultivate a scathing rebuttal. “It isn’t smut, fuck you very much, it’s romance. And I do not apologize for my romantic bent having a thoroughly sexual vein running through it. If you pardon my phallic pun of sorts.” Quips the pudgy gentleman from his rustic looking deck chair. “Who the fuck asked you in the first place? As I recall, Benji, I pay you to look after my gardens not to interrupt me when my pages are finally starting to come together!” Leaning back now in his cruddy wicker deck chair, stretching until his spine pops loudly between his shoulder blades the pudgy writer smiles and waves lazily at a mosquito buzzing by his ear. The garden isn’t huge, but it’s quiet and secluded with massive rhododendrons and lilac bushes, surrounded by forsythia and Russian Olive trees. The garden smells divine on this late spring afternoon. A big proponent of hostas and day lilies and all manner of shrubs, the writer is slowly rising from his chair. “What do you care anyway Benji? I didn’t think you even read my stuff.” Standing a few steps away, half buried in the overgrowth of a gargantuan rhododendron Benji quips “I fucking well don’t, but I caught Gary reading one in the tub last night and I could hear his breath catch in his throat. He moans ever so softly to himself when he reads anything racy. So I picked up the book to peruse the chapter he was reading and it was all about throbbing this, and heaving that, with glistening chests and wetness and moisture. Oh god! It’s so hackey, it’s like every tainted soft core porno trope wrapped up in a bow. I couldn’t believe Gary was so turned on by it!” Benji is sweating profusely under the partial cover of the shrub, not only because it’s thirty some odd degrees in the cloudless heat. “Gary reads my stuff? I’m touched. People keep buying it, so I’ll continue to write it. Also, as a side note, my mother wants you to deadhead my roses again this year, she likes to see the bushes in full bloom from her bedroom window.” Both men turn away from the rhododendron to face across the yard to the next house over, where a tiny ancient woman sits smiling and waving from her modest porch overlooking the garden. “Damn straight Benji!, my little Julian wants me to be able to see those roses in bloom! From my bed!” Benji’s face contorts between a smirk and a grimace. “Oh of course my dearie, any thing for you – you shrivelled hag” he mutters under his breath. “Come at me you bitch!” Blurts the elderly woman while waving both arthritic middle fingers around in a figure eight pattern. “You leave my lovely boys alone, you know how much my Gary and Julian mean to me!”
Having some fun messing around with 3d rendering.
So over the last few years I have doodled some faux beer brands for shits & giggles to keep busy and sane. Well now I am able to render them most realistically and in about 1/10th of the time my old method took me. Which makes me both happy and excited for the future of my graphic design business. Mock ups won’t eat up endless hours of my day anymore. Wah whooh!
Some samples with and without lighting effects and/or surface effects:
So I wrote a book of interconnected short stories set mostly out in space.
You can of course read most if not all of it for free when you search my archives, or if you are a Kindle/ Kindle Unlimited user you can read it all in one place on your handy device as you please for $.99 USD or $1.24 CDN or £.77 UK pounds. That’s as cheap as I can make it and still make it available in 11 different markets under Amazon.
It was a great run.
A bitter sweet moment has arrived now that I have completed the entirety of my four terrain boards to build one large interconnected 4ft by 4ft gaming table. Just in time too, as I came perilously close to finishing off my modpodge, ground cover, spring & summer grass flocking, foam stock and various colours of paint. Not to mention the store bought pepples and decorative sand. Phew – it was a nail biter. All of my best trees were used and the last few are so tiny I’m not sure how or what I’d ever use them on. Without further ado, I present my newest war gaming terrain build, and the final grouping.
I am happy with how they turned out. I might have miscalculated the foam alignments, but as I built them all separately I am not surprised by this at all. I look forward to many hours of story telling, make believe and quality time with my girls playing war games and D&D on these things. I’m in the process of building us each our own dice trays and at least one dice tower. In a few years I’d actually love to build a proper table (a nice one with hand cut joinery) for games that can be left set up. Now I need to finish reading my manuals and handbooks, nerf some stories or do up some homebrew adventures.
I followed all the same steps from boards 1 through 3. Although we chose the coldest day in March to try to cut foam outdoors to avoid the smell and fumes ( which worked for our health, but left us with numb fingers, and a perpetually cold hot knife). Memories – that’s how we make’em.
Simple-fast snack sandwich.
This assumes you own a few things, such as a toaster, a microwave, a knife, a whisk/fork, at least one small breakfast/cereal bowl and 90-130 seconds of time. And of course, one egg, some cheese and a slice of some sort of protein from a deli counter (in my instance that is German Salami).
Crack one egg into a small bowl. Shake in a little salt and pepper. Whisk/stir with a fork to get a uniform yellow colour of the egg. Slap in one slice of salami. Dunk under egg with whisk/fork so it is covered. Add several small chunks of a cheese you own and/or like. Microwave for 90 seconds. Place bagel or bread in a toaster for however long yours runs at the setting you like. Ours is also nearly 110 seconds. Once the bagel pops and the microwave pings, I spread on some Herb & Garlic cream cheese, scoop the egg & cheese blob onto the bagel and consume. *You may note that a knife is handy to extricate your egg from its bowl, and for spreading your variant of cream cheese or butter on your bread of choice. Simple, tastey and effective. I have a step by step follow along procedure below, so even the young or hapless can get something vaguely nutritious to eat.
Must haves: toaster, toaster oven, microwave, bowl or cup that works in a microwave, one knife, one fork or whisk. Also relevant: eggs, bread in one form or another, a slice of deli meat protein, salt & pepper, some form of cheese you find palatable, a bread spread like butter or cream cheese. Kind of important: at least 90-120 seconds of time to prepare and cook said sandwich. **if you are lactose intolerant, vegan, or Celiac I would expect you to make as many substitutions as needed for your own peace of mind and safety.
Bedtime reading aloud for any littles out there.
I certainly don’t fancy myself a voice talent, but for the times I am away and my youngest wants her bedtime story, I have recorded a read through of One fish two fish for safe keeping.
I usually bellow my voices, but I recorded late into the evening after my children had gone to sleep, so I’m a tad subdued. I love reading to my children, and I hope that comes through in the recording. I hope this brings even the tiniest spark of joy to your littles too. And yes, I did skip the Ish wish dish spread as it’s my least favourite one to do. When my eldest was little I used to read the whole lot, and the actual Cat in the Hat book in an Alan Rickman voice. I just can’t seem to do it now though. It certainly kept me engaged in the readings after doing it a hundred plus times. Take care out there. – M
My go to fridge clearing recipe.
First I chop up left over cloves of garlic, green onion and sweet onion and pop that in a large sauce pan with a smidge of olive oil to brown up for a couple minutes. Then I chop up and add carrots, celery, bell peppers, diced potatoes and a healthy dose of unsalted beef broth/vegetable broth. Occasionally I will add in a splash of OJ or lemon juice for a bit of a zip. Boil that until it simmers and the broth begins to reduce down to a thicker (think less than watery) consistency. In a separate cast iron pan I will crisp up and brown both bacon and chicken. Once the bacon has a good crunch, and the chicken has a crispy browned crust I plop them both into the veggie pan. Add as much honey garlic sauce as you like to the total mixture, let simmer and serve. I don’t typically add any salt, as the bacon and honey garlic sauce tend to have a significant amount in them. You can add virtually anything you have in your fridge in just about any quantity. I like that it changes from meal to meal. Looks like a dogs breakfast but tastes great, and is 75% vegetable and could easily be all vegetarian if you were so inclined.
Some things you will need: At least 2 sauce pans – chopping board – knife – spatula – 2 stove top burners
Things you might use in the recipe: Aromatics; Sweet onion, garlic cloves, green onion, ginger Meats; bacon, chicken, beef, or pork sausage Vegetables; carrots, celery, sweet bell peppers, potatoes, zucchini, egg plant, and a whole slew of others. Basically whatever you have in your fridge in whatever amount you have left. Sauces & Broths; I prefer to use the salt reduced Campbell’s Vegetable broth or beef broth, but if you like Knorr or Bovril have at it. I do like to splash in some OJ or lemon juice. And to top it off I like some Kikoman soy sauce (salty af, so that’s why I don’t have salt or pepper in the ingredients list) and then some form of a Honey Garlic Sauce. Add to taste.
Mix it all together and serve. If you use potatoes in your meal cook it all until they are done ( or if you are impatient run them through the microwave for 10:00 minutes before placing in the sauce pan – but you still have to wait on those pesky carrots!).
Well, I’ve gone and done it again. Terrain build #3.
I’ve always wanted to have an interconnected series of gaming terain boards and now I’m on a mission to complete all four 2ft by 2ft boards.
The third installment sees us come up against some steep shoreline, more water, cliffs, and a ruined temple upon a plateau with trees growing out of its discarded rubble. I also tried something new with this build in terms of materials: namely tile grout that hardens to stone with the liberal application of just plain water. Choosing the right colour was/is an ongoing challenge unless you can store multiple sacks and/or boxes of the stuff.
Here are the build images in progression.
If you looked this far, and read that, thanks for following along. One more build to go and then I’ll have to move on to my woodshop projects. Almost finished the Harry Potter trunk I’m building for my daughters book collection, wand, robes, tie, glasses and D&D dice. All I need to finish it is the burgundy felt I ordered to line the inside in Gryffindor colours. Catch you around.
We’re out here in the early spring boiling up maple syrup.
Much like the title told you, we’re busy during the spring time tapping, transporting, straining, filtering and boiling maple syrup like a bunch of Canuck rubes. Lovely weather and a lake side view are very much appreciated when on fire duty, watching that we don’t boil over the evaporator. Sometimes smells divine, other times tastes like ashe and smoke on the wind. Good times.
A bit of media for the terrain build.
I’m not a vlogger or youtuber so my video snippets are few and far between. But here’s a short flyby of my two completed terrain boards with a few minis in tableau on one half. I’ll be back to writing my short story series about The Chronicles of Kelvin soon enough. So fear not, I’m not transitioning to only war gaming, or recipes or short blurbs about nothing much at all. Take care out there folks. And with no further ado, my terrain build in video format.
And because I’m proud of much of it, my book case full of bust sculpts from my home office.
Greatwall Studios Graphic Design 
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